Department of Health News

This news item expired on 4/27/2012, so the information below could be outdated or incorrect.

Buncombe Health Rankings Released

Buncombe County ranks 14th in overall health according to County Healthy Rankings just released by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin’s Population Health Institute.

Nearly every county in the nation is ranked on health outcomes (how healthy we are) and on health factors (how healthy we can be).

Examples of specific measures used to calculate the Rankings include adult smoking, obesity, access to healthy foods and physical activity, binge drinking, access to primary care physicians, rates of high school graduation, rates of violent crime, air pollution levels, unemployment rates and number of children living in poverty.

This information helps the county see where we are doing well and where improvement is needed to ensure that our community is a healthy place to live, learn, work and play. Check out the chart below for more comparisons.